Biogen Q1 Sales Beat Street, Guidance Strong

Big-cap biotech Biogen Idec (BIIB) reported solid Q1 revenue early Wednesday and guided 2014 above Wall Street's expectations, but the stock was down more than 1% in early trading in the stock market today.

Biogen said revenue rose 50.5% over the year-earlier quarter, to $2.13 billion, beating analysts' consensus of $2 billion. But earnings per share of $2.47, up 25%, missed consensus of $2.56. The company, however, noted that included a $118 million payment to Japan's Eisai for their partnership on Alzheimer's disease, which analysts didn't expect because terms weren't disclosed at the time the deal was announced.

Biogen lifted its 2014 sales growth guidance range to 26% to 28%, where the Street was expecting 24.5% on average. It set the EPS range at $11.35-$11.45, topping consensus of $11.32.

Nearly all individual product sales beat consensus. CEO George Scangos noted the one-year anniversary of oral multiple-sclerosis drug Tecfidera in the U.S., and it continued to perform well with sales of $460 million vs. consensus of $413 million. Older MS drug Tysabri missed U.S. sales expectations, at $234 million, but its foreign sales beat made up the difference.

On a conference call with analysts, Biogen Chief Financial Officer Paul Clancy noted that the U.S. Tysabri sales miss was partly due to the company's custom of shipping the drug every Tuesday, and there happened to be 12 Tuesdays in Q1 instead of the usual 13. He said the "buoyancy" of Tysabri sales, as well as those of injectable Avonex, led to the sales guidance increase. Tecfidera sales were "marching along in accordance with our expectations."

Analyst Mark Schoenebaum of ISI Group wrote in an email to clients that U.S. Tecfidera sales were also probably in accordance with buy-side expectations. But he pointed out that the ex-U.S. sales of $46 million walloped consensus of $25 million.

"This is very important to watch as the company has been downplaying ROW (rest of world) launch expectations a bit and it's possible that they surprise significantly this year," he wrote.

Biogen is still rolling out Tecfidera in Europe through the long process of arranging reimbursement country by country. Clancy said Germany was the main contributor to foreign sales.

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03/26/2015 05:28 PM ET

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